From the people who brought us The Story of Stuff comes The Story of Cap and Trade (link). From the description:
The Story of Cap & Trade is a fast-paced, fact-filled look at the leading climate solution – emissions trading – on the negotiating table at Copenhagen and in other capitals. Host Annie Leonard introduces the energy traders and Wall Street financiers at the heart of this scheme and reveals the “devils in the details” in current cap and trade proposals: free permits to big polluters, fake offsets and distraction from what’s really required to tackle the climate crisis. If you’ve heard about Cap & Trade, but aren’t sure how it works (or who benefits), this is the film is for you.
Survival International has issued a report exposing four “mitigation measures” that are harmful for tribal people: biofuels, dams, forest conservation and carbon offsetting (PDF). All these measures lead to a massive land grab in places inhabited by indigenous people.
Survival Director Stephen Corry says:
This report highlights ‘the most inconvenient truth of all’ – that the world’s tribal people, who have done the least to cause climate change and are most affected by it, are now having their rights violated and land devastated in the name of attempts to stop it. Hiding behind the global push to prevent climate change, governments and companies are mounting a massive land grab. As usual, where money and vast profits are at stake, the world’s indigenous people are being shamefully swept aside.
To lower the meat production costs, agribusiness corporations have increasingly used soy grown in Latin America to feed cattle. The cheap soy usually comes from deforested areas, namely in the Amazon, and the production methods envolve GMO’s and large doses of pesticides.
This is the story of “Killing Fields”, a docummentary made by Friends of the Earth, Food and Water Watch, Via Campesina and other NGO’s. In the website (link) it is possible to view the video or download it.
Carbon Trade Watch has just launched a new book on carbon markets. “Carbon Trading – How it works and why it fails” (available here for download) was written by investigators Oscar Reyes and Tamra Gilbertson and is a indispensable tool for anyone who cares about climate justice or simply wonders why is it so hard to get an international agreement to stop global warming. A great Christmas present!
In an interview posted by the Indymedia (link), the delegate for Bolivia at the COP-15 talks of climate justice and tells activists around the world to take action. He explains how his government will defend the creation of an international tribunal on environmental crimes and the wealth transfer from the North to the South based on the concept of ecological debt. For the first time, these issues will be on the negotiating table, thanks to the social movements that managed to put in power a government which defends the poor and indigenous peoples.
The delegate is Cristian Domínguez, Bolivian Secretary of Environment and Resources. He is a leader of the United Confederation of Bolivian Campesino Workers and member of the International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change.
The most comprehensive study conducted so far on the impacts of increased CO2 emissions, published in Nature Geoscience, estimates an increase in gloal temperatures of about 6 ºC until the end of this century – a doomsday scenario. Corinne Le Quéré, of the University of East Anglia, who led the study said (Guardian):
Based on our knowledge of recent trends in CO2 emissions and the time it takes to change energy infrastructure around the world and on the response of the sinks to climate change and variability, the Copenhagen conference is our last chance to stabilise climate at 2C above preindustrial levels in a smooth and organised way.
These findings haven’t impressed world leaders. In fact, they are announcing that no binding deal will come out of Copenhagen (NY Times). Seventeen years after the first international agreement to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions, these guys are still saying that they need more time to prevent big corporations from cooking up the planet. If we let them be,our world will be much different in the future.
The Copenhagen mermaid is mad about corporate lobbies using all their power to continue polluting the planet. So, several NGO’s launched a website for the angry mermaid award (link), dedicated to elect the worst corporate lobby. I’ve voted for the International Emissions Trading Association, for promoting carbon trading.
